Mysooru Flashbacks 4: The Blue Shirt

Prom, Harry and I were all in different sections during the first year; Prom was in 'A', Harry in 'F' and me was in 'B'. That was good in a way 'cos we ended up making thrice the number of friends than we'd have if we were all clubbed together. And given we had representation from all streams in all sections, we had a good spread of friends from different disciplines.

Prom and I had classes mostly in the morning session (A-D sections) while Harry's classes started later (E-H sections), with a few exceptions.

It was the 2nd semester and I distinctly remember having classes later than the two of them on one day of the week; Engineering Drawing was the reason. On one such wonderful June afternoon, I started cycling back home after class. In no time, it started pouring and even in the shelter of a roadside tree, the rain was fierce enough for me to get drenched. After the rain subsided a bit, the homeward journey continued.

Amazingly enough, there wasn't a drop of rain near our house. So, when I showed up at the front door dripping wet, Prom and Harry thought I was nuts; they wouldn't believe that it was raining near the college. I was a victim of their butt of jokes for a while :-)

It so happened that I wore a sky blue checkered shirt that day. As luck would have it, more often than not, it'd rain on days I wore the shirt. If we were going out (mostly to a movie) and I wore the shirt, Prom wouldn't let me out of the house till I changed.

And no, I don't have that shirt any longer. Can't remember if it wore out or I gave it away to someone.

Mysooru Flashbacks 3: Pinto!

Very early in our first year, Pinto would strike fear in all three of us. Pinto was our owner's Samoyed and still ranks as the most ferocious little dog I've ever encountered.

The count of the number of people it had bitten, we were told, was 12 when we first moved in. By the time we left 13 months later, the count had risen to 14; 13th victim was our owner's younger son, while our landlady was no 14! To this day, I am amazed at us having escaped its wrath, even if it were by a whisker sometimes.

We had strict orders to lock the gate in the nights. Normally, that was no big deal; but with Pinto around, it was an ordeal! The steps went like this:

1. One of us (the locker), with lock and key in hand would scour around to make sure Pinto wasn't in range
2. The other two would wait at the door, in position to close it as soon as the locker got back in
3. Rush out to the gate, lock making as little noise as possible, and run back
4. If 'cos of the sound of the gate, Pinto ran into range, locker would run back, hopefully having locked the gate by then
5. If the gate wasn't locked yet, repeat from step 1.

Over time, we got used to Pinto, and I guess Pinto got bored of us :-)

Prom was especially miffed from time to time with Pinto 'cos it'd be a herculean task getting visitors inside the house when our owners were out. To vent his frustration, Prom would sometimes get a few small pebbles and drop them from the first floor close to where Pinto was. The dumb dog would just run round and round trying to find where the sound and stone came from. This was Prom's recreation.

One particular lady hawker who'd peddle greens was the most angry with Pinto 'cos he'd never stop barking when she was anywhere close to the house. One fine day, she got what we call "chur-churke soppu" (don't know what its called in English though - but its a type of green that causes extensive itching when it comes in contact with the skin) and teased it close to the gate, just so Pinto could smell it. Poor dog, for the next couple of hours, it was rubbing its nose in the sand to get rid of the itch.